WRITING A MEMOIR IS HARD WORK!

Before I start this post I want to talk about a memory jogger I left out of the last  one.  Some people believe that the best memory reminder is one of the five senses--the sense of smell. You're probably thinking, "no way."  But try it and you will agree an aroma from your past will conjure up memories.  If I think of my elementary school I smell the oil on the old, worn wooden floors and the cooking odors which clung to the ceiling of the basement.  The basement--lots of activities went on down there--first and second grade class rooms, the cafeteria, the clothes closet, the custodians' niche beside the furnace.  It was the place where we had cake walks and where once a week government issued foods were given  out because we lived in a depressed area of the Appalachian Mountains. There was the special place in the far end of the cafeteria where I had my little second grade remedial reading class when I was in the sixth  grade.  See what mentioning an scent in my elementary school brought about!

"WHEN YOU SET DOWN A TRUTH ABOUT THE PAST A NEW FUTURE DAWNS" (Shimmering Images" by Lisa Dale Norton, ISBN 6312382928, Macmillan, 2008 )  That is a strong statement.  But I believe it. I also, believe that writing a good memoir takes work.  The author of "Shimmering Images" states, "Writing about your life is hard work.  It requires you to be emotionally truthful and truthful tales of the inner life are hard to get out, a little like digging embedded slivers from the soft part of your hand,"

Students have come into my classes with no clue how to begin to set down their memoirs.  i remind them that you came to class and hopefully together we'll figure it out.  The first thing they have to realize is that most of us want to write about too many memories in our first try. Lesson one--"Put Your Memories On a Diet."  Here's a small example of how to do that:

List you have made of things you would like to write about;

1. My birth on Christmas Day.
2. Growing up in the forty's
3. My first baseball game.
4. My little sister's talent.
5.. My first camera.
6. Crosscountry camping trip
7. Catching my first fish on the crosscountry trip.
8. My first car.
9. My first day at school.

Take a look at your list and choose topics that could be put together.
 How about the crosscountry trip, add catching my first fish, and surely you took pictures with your camera on that trip. It could be that your sister's special talent was used.

Now you have something to build the frame work.  If you cannot come up with enough details to fill in a section of the story, ask someone who was there on the trip, a parent , perhaps.  This memoir you are constructing is about one major incident--a crosscountry trip.  It is just one slice of the pie.

In the next post we will talk about how to add flavor to the pie so your readers will ask for more!

Comments are invited.